The long anticipated publication of Finnegans Wake on 4 May 1939 inaugurated a flurry of critical reviews by writers, scholars and ordinary readers around the world. The Joyce newspaper clipping collection from this period is exceptionally diverse and comprehensive. Finnegans Wake elicited passionate responses from readers and boycotters alike.

A. Open to the diagram, this is an advance copy of the first edition of Finnegans Wake, Faber & Faber (London, 1939). It is a unique, unbound copy, with dust jacket, that Joyce and Paul Léon used to make corrections for the text (VI.H.4.a.). By April 1939, Joyce had already begun complaining about errors in the text of Finnegans Wake. In July, with the assistance of Paul Léon, in whose hand the errata appears, Joyce began the process of correcting the text. A typed list of errata was then prepared from this manuscript (VI.H.1). A printed errata list was first published with the text in 1945.

B. Publication announcements, such as this one, of another book by the author of Ulysses appeared in newspapers around the world. Here is a report in the West Australian (Perth, Australia, 18 March 1939).

C. Here, in another of the first extensive reviews, is the Observer (London, 7 May 1939). Oliver St. John Gogarty, himself resentful of his representation as Buck Mulligan in Ulysses, claims in "Roots in Resentment: James Joyce’s Revenge" that Joyce’s resentment against European civilization and life itself is self-evident: "This arch-mocker in his rage would extract the Logos, the Divine word or Reason from its tabernacle, and turn it muttering and maudlin into the street."

D. These articles are indicative of the general bewilderment with which Finnegans Wake was received in small city newspapers in America and the world over. From left to right: the Express (Portland, Maine, 6 May 1939) and the Citizen (Brooklyn, New York, 22 May 1939).

E. In the New York Times (New York, 7 May 1939), Padriac Colum, a friend and consistent supporter of Joyce’s work, offers one of the first extensive reviews of Finnegans Wake just three days after its publication. The sketch of Joyce is by Augustus John, another of Joyce’s Irish friends.

F. One of a series of photos by Gisèle Freund taken in 1938 of Joyce, his family, and circle of friends. In this one Joyce is seated at a piano in his apartment with Giorgio by his side.

G. Whether in lieu of commentary or in praise of its musical language, initial reviews of Finnegans Wake regularly took recourse to quotation from the text or inventively mimicked the style of the book. These four articles are fine examples: Free Press (Detroit, Michigan, 11 May 1939), "Good Morning: Icky-Wicky Nutzy," by Malcolm W. Bingay; Manchester Guardian (Manchester, England, 12 May 1939), "In Lieu of Review," by B. Ifor Evans; (below, left): Courier Express, (Buffalo, New York, 7 May 1939) [n.t.; unsigned], which reads:

There is no question that James Joyce is not only a learned, but a brilliant man; he knows all languages and all people, but what is he saying? Your guess is as good as ours and better.

Those who were not amused by Joyce’s literary innovations were often disgusted and wrote condemnatory letters to the editors like the two here (Bottom right corner): "Incoherent Rot," Time Magazine, (New York, 29 May 1939); News Republican, (Boone, Iowa, 27 May 1939); and "The Beachcomber" in the Daily Express, (London, 11 May 1939), "By the Way," writes:

He is completely unintelligible, […] and precious dull and stupid it is. But it would be interesting to know what led the author of such a story as "The Dead" to abandon all the conventions of writing.

H. The "Bookshop Notes" in the Publisher’s Weekly (New York, 13 May 1939) announces the James Joyce Society’s celebration of the publication of Finnegans Wake at the Gotham Book Mart. John Slocum (bottom right) was an early Joyce enthusiast and bibliographer, New York book collector and the benefactor of the Joyce Collection at Yale.

I. The Bookseller’s "What the Other Fellow is Selling" (London, 15 June 1939) lists Finnegans Wake as one of the best selling books in English bookstores, after Mein Kampf and Gone With the Wind.

J. Finally, this a reproduction of crayon drawing of her father by Lucia Joyce (the delicate original is also in the collection).

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